Dissection
by Musino
Summary: Elliot blows a gasket, but maybe that's a good thing for Olivia. But maybe not...
1. Emotional Distress

Emotional Distress  
"These wounds won't seem to heal...there's just too much that time cannot erase"

Olivia stared at the mangled corpse. The girl must have been about fifteen. Elliot turned his face, hoping Olivia wouldn't notice. She patted his back. "It's ok," she told him.  
"I keep thinking I'll find Kathleen like this. Besides, what this guy did to her..." he trailed off, unable to produce the words to explain the carnage before them. The murderer-rapist had slit the girl's wrists, raped her, and then cut her all over with a switchblade or utility knife, watching her as she slowly bled to death. Melinda took a rape kit, but she knew it would be useless, as the blood had tainted the fluids.  
"I know. It's pretty gruesome," Olivia comforted him, although she felt no discomfort. It was after eleven. "Well, I think we should get some sleep and work on it first thing tomorrow morning."  
"Do you want a ride home?" her over-protective partner asked. Ever since she'd been forced to shoot her stalker, he constantly worried about her safety, and ever since his wife died in a car accident, he was more emotional than Olivia had ever been herself.  
"I'll be fine," the detective replied, looking deeply into his ice blue eyes, her hand resting on his muscular shoulder. "There's a bus coming by soon, it'll drop me off three blocks from my apartment."  
"This late?"  
"Service here stops at 11:30. See you tomorrow, she told him, and commandingly walked over the crime scene tape CSU had placed half and hour before.  
Olivia Benson lay in bed, dozing off and waking up, realizing her body wanted to play games before it shut down for the night. The stunningly loud noise of her cell phone, amplified by the wood table it sat on, woke her with its urgent ring. She rolled of her bed grumpily.  
"Benson," she said into the phone, her annoyance clear.  
"Hey, Liv." It was her partner. "I just wanted to make sure you got home safe."  
"Yeah. Thanks."  
"Well, don't let the bedbugs bite."  
She chuckled. He too must be exhausted, teasing her as he would the twins.  
"Good night, Elliot," she told him.  
"Good night."  
Realizing she wouldn't be able to get to sleep for a bit, Olivia strolled over to her kitchen and made a cup of hot cocoa—heavy on the sugar. It brought back memories of her high school years. She was a sophomore when forced to take Biology. It came first period for her, which was fine until the dissection unit. She and her best friend, Annelisse, had always stopped by the gas station for hot cocoa on their way to school; the inside of a female frog, their first dissection, quickly put an end to Annelisse's habit, although Olivia still loved it.  
About that time, a couple weeks, maybe a month before the dissections, Olivia'd done a little experimentational dissecting herself. Her mother, it seemed, was either constantly drunk or hung-over, her grades were steadily dropping , no matter how hard she studied, and the junior she had a crush on and had just been promised a movie by had committed suicide. It was a natural way to deal with all the stress, a counselor told her later—she didn't have to be ashamed of cutting herself.  
It started strangely—some of the girls she walked home from school with bragged to her about their piercings and tattoos—and, once they were sure they could trust her—how they cut themselves as a release. She tried it one day, a pair of silver scissors stained with drops of ruby blood. She started on her upper leg, where no one would see—it felt so good, the pain was almost redeeming. Next, she moved to her wrists. She covered them with band aids, covering those with watches, bracelets, and long sleeves. Finally, Annelisse told her she knew and threatened to tell the principal, so she stopped out of embarrassment and fear. By then, the emotional river had run dry, and she felt—at least she thought so—better.  
Since the cutting had instilled in her a guard against any squeamishness her classmates had, she was the ideal dissection student. She dissected each organism carefully and with respect, amazed at how neatly the insides fit together. Mr. Zwinel, the teacher, found himself spending a great deal of first period at Olivia's lab station, helping her, showing here where to cut and what to notice.  
Recalling the emotional roller coaster called high school had exhausted Olivia and her mug of hot cocoa. She put the mug to soak in the sink and loped back to her still-warm bed, snuggling another pillow under the comforting covers. 


	2. Bedbugs

Disclaimer (supposedly in first chapter) Please, folks, do not think the message is to imflict pain as a way of coping; it takes a long time to quit, a toll on the people you love, and it does not improve the state of things.

Credit Dick Wolf with what is Dick Wolf's and me with what is mine.

Bedbugs

"...but who can decide what they dream, and dream I do..."

She looked around. She couldn't be back here—but yes, here was Annelisse, sipping hot cocoa from a cup identical to the one Olivia found in her own small palms on the first day of the dissection unit. She lifted the plastic cup to her lips and winced as the band aids rubbed against her wrists. Setting the mug down, she told Anna to go inside as she loosened her watch and rolled up her sleeves. Carefully tearing off the adhesive, Olivia peeked under the bandage. There was nothing there—the unbroken skin, free of any scars, with healthy veins rising above the smooth surface of her slender wrists. Olivia shrugged. That was fine. She gulped the last of her drink, tossed the empty cup in the trash, and walked in the classroom. To her surprise, it didn't smell of formaldehyde.  
"Ah, Miss Benson, welcome, I thought you would be late," Mr. Zwinel greeted her at the door as she took her seat at the front of the alphabetically arranged class and the bell rang.  
"Sorry" she murmured, glancing up at the board. Where he usually had listed the name of the creature to be dissected were simply the words "phylum" "scientific name" and "common name" written on the ancient blackboard in chalk.  
"Today, we are going to have a slight change of plans. We were going to dissect a frog today' however, because of an error ordering them, we have been forced to procure another animal." He walked over to the board and wrote under "phylum" "Chordata"; under "scientific name" "Homo Sapiens", and as he raised his left hand to scribe to common name, he paused, looking at Olivia, smiling. "Olivia Benson," he wrote in eerie red chalk.  
Panic gripped her in a tight fist around her ribs, but she remained calm and still on the outside. She trusted her teacher completely; this had to be a joke. The next thing she knew, she was at her lab desk, silver scissors in her right hand. Annelisse sat across from her, looking on, interested. Zwinel stood at the end of the short table, watching eagerly. Not realizing what she was doing, Olivia cut a line along her vein up to the base of her hand, then pushed the skin back. It was exactly like any other dissection—all the blood and fluids had been drained. She felt nothing but her right thumb and middle finger operating the scissors, seeing the gleaming metal flash in the reflection of Zwinel's glasses. She looked to him for approval. He nodded proudly, smiling, not saying a word. She screamed.  
  
She woke up panting, still screaming. Her alarm clock screamed with her until it registered in her poor mind and was hurled across the room, its batteries spilling out. That had been the most terrible nightmare she'd had. She gazed at her wrists, rubbing the dull purple marks that would remain there until she died. She knew Huang had noticed them, but she'd never told anyone but that counselor. She'd give anything to undo the scars—not only were they hideous, but they were a constant reminder of how she could never be truly happy.  
Olivia heard a sharp knocking at her door. "Olivia?" she heard a familiar voice, disguised by agitation, say.  
Muttering to herself about how one could never have a nightmare all by oneself and cursing the jerk behind the door, she donned her blue fuzzy bathrobe over her matching nightgown, and, stuffing her gun in her pocket, ambled over to the door, peered through the peephole, cursed at the top of her sleepy lungs, and opened the door to a suddenly humbled partner.  
"What?" she asked in the crankiest voice she could muster.  
"Sorry. I heard the scream, the thud, and I..." He faltered for the second time in six hours.  
"How the hell'd you get over here?"  
"I kept thinking about you. I came over after about two. I got by the doorman with the badge...Sorry," he offered, embarrassed. "Is everything all right?"  
"I'm fine," she told him, embarrassed as well, turning red quickly. "I let those bedbugs get into my dreams," she explained, smiling apologetically.  
"Ok," he said. They hugged. Olivia, though she hated to admit it, loved the feeling of someone to hug after such a mess. But it was too soon after Kathy's death to think of anything further.  
"See you at the precinct in a couple hours," she suggested.  
"Ok," he replied, scruffing her bed hair playfully, then headed down the stairs.  
She smiled after him, walked over to the stove, and made a cup of coffee. She'd had enough hot cocoa for a while. 


	3. Rockabye

Rockabye

"...and just before she hangs her head to cry, I sing her a lullaby..."

She was on the bus. "What a dreary day," she thought, as she looked out the grimy window and dozed off.

She was talking to the school counselor. Because of the cutting, Olivia had decided to take him up on his offer. He always invited the single parented kids to talk to him sometime. He usually creeped her out, but not now. She realized why when she looked up at him.

"Dr. Huang?" she asked, stunned.

"Yes? Oh, Olivia." He acted as if he'd been woken up from a trance. Perhaps psychoanalyzing everyone he met had finally taken a toll. "It's been a tough situation for me. It seems to have been a tough situation for you as well. It's not abnormal for a woman your age and with these experiences to come to see me. But it is abnormal to keep thinking about cutting yourself."

"Well, I don't know," she heard herself say. "I mean, look at my job. I have to be aggressive, even violent."

"And you think this makes you like the kids you walked home with?"

"I kept trying to convince myself, you know, that they had a choice—be a cutter, don't be a cutter, be violent, don't be violent, but if they had this aggression in side them...even violence, do they have a choice? Does anyone?" That sounded familiar. Huang stood up from his desk, picked up a pen, and walked over beside her.

"This song always seems to comfort people," he told her, obviously feeling incompetent. Holding the pen, he crooned to her...

"Everything's gonna be all right, rockabye...rockabye..."

Olivia woke up, disturbed but laughing, right before her stop. This was going to be a good day, she thought, as she walked into the precinct. Even her subconscious, in the form of the FBI, knew it.

Ok, I have to do another disclaimer; I don't own Evanescence or Shawn Mullins, their music just fits very well with how this is going.


	4. Haunted

Haunted

"...watching me, wanting me, I can feel you pull me down..."

Yes, that day was a good day. As was the day after, and the day after that. But then there was the next day.

"Put your gun down," she told him.

"There aren't any bullets," he sneered at her as he lowered his gun to his hostage's head. Her hand jerked back—once, twice, and his blood spattered on the wall behind him—once, twice. She couldn't get it out of her head.

That night, she had a mug of hot cocoa, even though she knew better. She curled up on her bed, still clasping her drink, and she dreamed again.

She saw the waitress from her first case at Special Victims, the woman who had killed the man responsible for so many rapes and torturing of women in their old country and killed her own family. Olivia watched again as the desperate woman plunged a knife into her own flesh to be with that family. She saw it over and over. She saw the man she killed who had trained his gun at Elliot, holding his stewardess wife hostage. She shot him—once, twice. Olivia kept pinching and pinching herself, but it only made the skin on her wrists peel off, reminding her of the dream she'd had a few nights before.

She saw Evan, the boy who had been abused by his piano teacher, and then abused another student. He showed her his letter from Julliard, the acceptance letter Elliot had opened for him. He kissed it—once, twice, then lit it on fire and tossed it to her feet. She saw the judge's wife, who killed her daughter with a beer bottle. Deep in her heart, Olivia still felt sorry for her. Then she saw Plummer. Again. And again. She kept opening the door to Aivilo Productions to find his crumpled body in a bloody heap on the floor, her handiwork. She blinked—once, twice, and found herself outside her apartment.

A kid ran past her, probably first grade. He was so irresistibly cute that she leaned toward him as he ran by, hoping to touch him, perhaps for good luck. "Get away from me!" he screamed as he dodged her. "All you do is ruin peoples' lives!" Then another kid ran, and then more, until there were dozens of children looking angrily at her without blinking in a huge group. One little girl stood in front of the crowd. Olivia recognized her in an instant. She was the daughter of the woman who had been raped, murdered, and buried with her sister's sex toys, and replaced in her unaware husband's bed by the same sister. "You've ruined so many lives," she shouted. "Don't you think you've done enough?"

Olivia felt herself nod, reaching to her gun belt, her fingers lovingly tracing its familiar shape, then darting out to grasp her weapon. "You're right," she told the chilled. She turned the gun to face her, cocked it and shot it hard—once, twice, burning into her chest.

The cocoa's spilling on her thin nightgown startled her, as the pure white cotton was disrupted by the two drops of liquid chocolate spread on the delicate gown. "This has got to stop," she muttered as she reached for the phone and dialed Huang's number. It wasn't eleven yet—he had to be up still. He could help.


	5. The Call for Help

The Call for Help

"...call my name and save me from the dark..."

Huang frowned at his noisy phone, but picked it up nevertheless.

"Huang here," he told the caller in his usual confident tone.

"Hey there, it's Olivia. Look, I need your help."

"What's wrong? I can be down at the station in 15 minutes," he told her as he reached for his jacket and shoes beside the couch.

"No, it's not that...it's me, Huang. I...I keep having these nightmares, you know...look, can I come to your office tomorrow?" she asked, nervously twisting the phone cord.

"Olivia, I'm a forensic psychiatrist...usually there's a death or rape when I'm needed. This would be a nice change, though. Why don't you take the day off, Olivia, and we can talk. If that doesn't help, there's a shrink I know—I'd highly recommend her. How does ten sound?"

"Ok, doc. Thanks a ton." Huang hung up and went back to watching "The Musicman" as Olivia turned her TV to the same station—she knew she couldn't get back to sleep, and didn't want to, for that matter. She and her mother went to the show when it was on Broadway. It hurt, but she had been dead for a while now...it was time to get over it.

At that time, Fin and Munch were hitting on girls at a bar in Manhattan, Monique was lying alone in her bed, plotting to kill the counselor, Cragen was out with Briscoe at a swanky restraint, and Elliot was asleep, cuddling a pillow he thought to be Kathy.

"Sweet dreams be yours dear, if dreams there be," Marian sang wistfully, "sweet dreams to carry you close to me...I wish I may, and I wish I might—now good night, my someone, good night." The detective and the doctor smiled and sat back in their respective chairs. It was a lonely song, but it threw a blanket of comfort over the two... "Good night, my someone...good night..."

"Is there a someone out there for me?" the two wondered.

However, Olivia, tired from the case she felt in her gut would never be solved and trying to stay up all night, fell asleep before the end of the musical. And she dreamed...

She was lying some where, it looked like Central Park, on a bed of brown decaying leaves surrounded by a rectangle of police tape. Elliot helped Warner over the tape, not taking his eyes off Olivia. The M.E. Olivia had always wished were her friend held her left wrist and remarked "I think there's enough for a DNA sample. I'll take a swab and run it back to the lab." She produced a pair of silver scissors and cut the wrist open, soaking up the blood with a DNA test kit. Olivia fought her off, and suddenly Warner was thrown back against a tree. Olivia looked up and saw Huang dusting off his hands. "Thanks," she told him. "Anything for a friend," he replied.

A/N: No, contrary to popular belief, I am not trying to kill or wound Olivia or give you nightmares.


	6. Release

To celestialdruid: thank you so much; to you i dedicate the rest of this fic. You have no idea how much your review meant.

Release

"...if I go crazy, then will you still call me superman?"

When she woke up, it was 8:55. She swore at herself similarly to how she had sworn at Stabler when he showed up at her door after the mother of all nightmares. She was late for work already because she hadn't set her alarm, and even though she was supposedly taking the day off, she had to tell Cragen in person, because he hadn't answered his phone the night before. Her stiff muscles complained all the way through a rushed morning routine and almost made her fall down the stairs in her haste. Thanks to her running when she had time in the mornings, she caught the bus about to leave a few blocks from her apartment and was in the squad room little more than half an hour later. Huang walked in right after her, making her eyebrow jump. She smiled at him, then headed to Cragen's office.

"Good morning, sleepyhead," Munch called to her as she passed on her walk of shame. Cragen, though angry, granted her the day off. When she walked over to her desk to collect a few things and head back home, Elliot cornered her.

"Liv, we need to talk," he said, obviously restraining himself—from what, she didn't know. Olivia looked at him somewhat blankly, but nodded and followed him to an interrogation room. 'Strange place to talk,' she thought, but realized it was probably the most solid and reassuring place for him to talk. "Look, Liv, are you sleeping with Huang?" Olivia started, pinching herself. This was reality. He would have never asked that if Kathy were still alive.

"No, Elliot!" she replied scornfully. He must be really low today, making such mean jokes.

"Oh yeah?" They both had been standing; now he forced her to sit down. He leered above her, with the smirk on his face he had when he was about to surprise a perp with the evidence that would give him the needle. "Then why are you late? Why do you look like hell?" She winced. "Why did you and Huang both walk in at the same time? Huh? Huh?"

"What are you talking about, Elliot?"

Munch chuckled, having followed them through the building and leading his partner to outside the room, "I haven't seen anyone so crazy since...well, since I told that girl you were hitting on you were a sex comp."

"I'd punch you again if I could," Fin informed him, watching as Munch nervously caressed his delicately bruised jaw.

"Well, what did you think I was going to do, let you con her into thinking that you managed a huge company in Philly?"

"Look, I was just trying to get some action...you know how hard it is to get some chick interested in you when she knows you're a cop? There's a huge difference, working in special vics instead of narcotics."

"Well,,," Munch started when a worried Huang walked into the observation area.

"Cragen told me to see what's going on. So who's being questioned..." he trailed off when he saw who were in the room.

"I saw the look you gave him. You used to give me that same teasing look when I still had Kathy, just to tempt me. I thought it meant you liked me, but obviously not, flirting with any guy who walks in the doors. Why don't you go ask Cragen, see if Huang can be your partner. And see if I care. You've re reason Kathy was always so suspicious around me. I'd stay out late, working for you, working with you, just being there fore you. I even was there when you had that so-called nightmare, and it turns you've been having him to turn to if you can't sleep at night. God, I hate you!"

"Is that true?" Munch asked Huang, a smile playing at the corner of his mouth. Huang gave him such a grave and admonishing look that both Munch and Fin immediately felt completely stupid. "Just truing to throw some soap opera crap into our lives," John offered to try and redeem himself, but they ignored him. Finally Cragen came.

"I told you to get me information," he rebuked the psychiatrist. "Why didn't you come...what the hell?" He leaned closer to the glass, nearly running into it. He had never seen Olivia completely melted like that, or Elliot go ballistic like that.

"Well, Stabler is...still emotionally edgy from Kathy's death. Since Olivia and I came in at approximately the same time, and Olivia had obviously had a rough night and overslept, he jumped to conclusions and thinks that she and I are having an affair. I think he just needs to blow off some steam. Olivia should be all right, though. I'll talk to her later."

"Well, are you?" Cragen asked, obviously concerned, but also a little jealous.

"Captain, I would never jeopardize the unit or the FBI's credibility and integrity by showing any such feelings, and neither would Olivia. I recommend you give Stabler the day off as well, so that he can become...well, stable."

"How did you know Olivia took the day off?" The three men raised their eyebrows at Huang. He sighed.

"She called me last night. She wanted to talk to me about something, and she seemed very upset. I advised her to take a day to calm down, and we agreed on a time she could meet with me if she so chose, which" he looked at his watch, "is not too long from now."

"Well, her mother died a while ago. She didn't do much at the time except brush it off. Maybe the floodgates are finally bursting," Huang accepted this explanation as a way to excuse himself from the conversation.

"I'll get them to calm down." He looked at the other men with pleading in his deep black eyes. "Don't tell them or give any indication that you know about this." They nodded and went back to their paperwork, Munch happy to get back to lecturing Fin on the suspiciousness of the Bermuda Triangle. Huang grinned at him, then opened the door. "Elliot," he told the suddenly sheepish detective. "How about you take the day off." Elliot nodded quickly.

"Yeah. Did...did the others see it?" he asked nervously.

"No," Hand said comfortingly as he produced an ironed white handkerchief for a red-faced Olivia. "In fact, I just found you." The detectives nodded their thanks.

"Sorry, doc," Elliot mumbled.

Huang held up his hand in response. "It's fine." Walking directly over to Olivia, Elliot helped her up from the chair and hugged her tightly.

"I'm so sorry, Liv," he told her gruffly, gently, and apologetically. She smiled through her tears.

"It's ok," she told him. "I understand. I do love you, Elliot. More than any guy I've dated. I would never hurt you like that."

"I...I just lost it. I'm sure you wouldn't I just..." He clenched his fists behind her back. "I still feel bad about Kathy. I'm not sure what she thought we were going...I guess I blame us for her..."

Olivia rubbed her hand against his back, loving the feel of his muscular body. "Look, Elliot, how about you have dinner at my place tonight. We can talk about this...in a place that isn't designed to be eavesdropped on."

"Ok," he told her, glad she had reached for her gun at no point. She went out first, leaving Huang and Elliot to get in an embarrassing situation to decide who would go out the door first. "I...I'm really sorry, doc," Elliot said. "I bet the whole squad was watching me embarrass you like that. I don't know how I can undo it."

"You can't," Huang told him, finally exiting. "However, since you've got the whole day, just do something you'll be distracted by, like going swimming or jogging. Then go to Olivia's. The person who will come out of this looking stupid is you; the person who will come out wounded is Olivia. I'll talk to her, but be very careful around her—and be sure to complement her cooking." They smiled, Huang broadly and Elliot guiltily.

"Thanks, doc," Elliot told him. He felt the urge to hug the psychiatrist, but decided against it.

As Olivia walked back to her desk and grabbed the items she'd left, Fin, Munch, and Cragen came up to her.

"If you want to talk about it, call me," Fin instructed her.

"If you want to take another day off, it's yours,: the captain told her.

"If you want to talk about UFOs, I'm here," Munch finished, giving her a donut. She giggled a bit, then beamed the smile Munch had been looking for.

"Thanks, you guys," she told them, and headed for Huang's office, papers and donut in hand.


End file.
